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Chapter 13 | Appeals: Processes and Outcomes
Appeals Allowed 2004 Samples:
Refugee Convention and ECHR Reasons
FEB MAY OCT
■ Appeals Allowed 26 total 25 total 9 total
■ Convention Reason / ECHR NUMBER PERCENT NUMBER PERCENT NUMBER PERCENT
Ethnic Origin 12 46% 13 52% 5 56%
Political Opinion 6 23% 9 36% 3 33%
Social Group 2 8% 1 4% – –
Religion 2 8% 2 8% – –
ECHR 4 15% 1 4% 1 11%
13.5 The Immigration Appeal
Tribunal
For nearly 12 years up until 4 April 2005, if
an unaccompanied or separated child’s
appeal was dismissed by an adjudicator he
or she could seek permission to appeal to a three
person Immigration Appeal Tribunal (IAT). 25 No
records are available from the Immigration Appellate
Authority of the number of the unaccompanied
or separated children who applied for or were
granted permission to appeal or the number of
children whose appeals were successful at this level.
Copies of determinations of appeals at the Tribunal
level were not available either. As a result it is not
possible to form a view of the treatment of children
in this context. Theoretically unaccompanied or
separated children whose appeals were dismissed by
the Immigration Appeal Tribunal could then seek
permission to appeal to the Court of Appeal and
then to the House of Lords. To date there have been
no reported decisions of any unaccompanied or
separated children appealing their substantive asylum
applications. 26
The fact that the research project was not able
to analyze determinations at Immigration Appeal
Tribunal level lost some of its relevance when the
IAT was abolished on 4 April 2005. Since then Immigration
Judges who sit in the new Asylum and
Immigration Tribunal have had a pivotal role in
decision making and it is recommendations made
in relation to their practice, training, and competence
which will be determinative of the prospects of
success for unaccompanied or separated children. 27
Compliance With International Standards
■ 1. The UNHCR states that where there are grounds
for believing that an unaccompanied child’s
parents wish him or her to be outside his or her
country of origin on grounds of a well founded
fear of him or her being persecuted, the unaccompanied
child can be presumed to also have
such a well founded fear. 28 173
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